Pamela Peyton Papka Sexton was a writer, poet, artist and community volunteer who helped create the Carnegie Center for Literacy & Learning in Lexington and was a dynamic advocate for the arts and education in Kentucky.
She grew up in Wyoming with parents who valued education and volunteerism. After that, she lived in New Orleans and Puerto Rico before moving to Lexington in 1971. Sexton had a variety of jobs in banking, business writing, women’s health and the arts.
Sexton studied at the University of Kentucky and Spalding University, where she earned a master of fine arts degree in writing in 2003. She also studied sculpture at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and the Cambridge Arts Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Sexton helped create the Carnegie Center in the historic Lexington Public Library building and later chaired its board of directors. “The Carnegie Center is a place where the light streams in, even on cloudy days,” she once wrote.
Her writing was widely published in Kentucky. She received a poetry award from the University of Kentucky’s Oswald Research & Creativity Competition and won the Leadingham Prize for Poetry from the Frankfort Arts Foundation. She was a founding member of KaBooM (the Kentucky Book Mafia), a writing group, and Mosaic, a group of women poets.
Sexton also served on the boards of the Kentucky Folk Art Center in Morehead, Lexington Children’s Theatre, the Lexington Arts and Cultural Council (now LexArts) and the Lexington Philharmonic.
She also was a founding member of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence. Robert Sexton, her second husband, later became its director. Pam Sexton died in 2014. She had three children: Ouita Michel of Midway, Perry Papka of Mount Sterling and Paige Walker of Lexington.
